They beat and tortured him to no end, but the Navy flyer’s patriotism manifested itself in historic defiance, refusing to do the easy thing for his own reward.

He would not accept freedom before other prisoners who’d been there longer than he: It wasn’t the right thing to do, he thought.

Instead, he gave the enemy hell.

Now he has brain cancer.

And he’s 80 years old.

It’s the appropriate time to loudly honor this war hero for his toughness and resolve in combat and captivity, but subsequently during his political career.

He has shown an integrity and individualism that goes unduplicated in modern politics.

Sen. John McCain consistently worked with the opposition — even when it wasn’t the easy thing to do, saying, “Our political differences, no matter how sharply they are debated, are really quite narrow in comparison to the remarkably durable national consensus on our founding convictions.”

During his presidential campaign he took the high road when cheap political opportunism would have made the path to victory easy.

Sacrifice is something McCain knew something about.

Yesterday, his daughter Meghan released a statement reading, “The cruelest enemy could not break him. The aggression of political life could not bend him. So he is meeting this challenge as he has every other.”

John McCain has stared death in the face several times in his life. He’s always made it through.